


Promise Me

by ShinobiCyrus



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Comfort Sex, Comrades, Friendship, Gift Fic, I gave it to my friend to post, It's all her fault, M/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr, also son of Jupiter, and now that I've given up denying my closet PJO fanboy status, because Romans, it's a Roman thing, it's not so much a Jason x Nico boyfriend fic as, platonic friendsex, she's letting me post it here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-23
Updated: 2014-01-23
Packaged: 2018-01-09 17:33:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1148874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShinobiCyrus/pseuds/ShinobiCyrus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jason is as Roman as they come. After the tomb he goes to Nico's cabin to support him as a comrade, and when he kisses him he's comforting him as a friend. In his mind, there is no contradiction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Promise Me

**Author's Note:**

> A fic I wrote for a friend's birthday. Slash fics, the gift that keeps on giving.

No one had really checked in on Nico since they’d gotten back from tomb. Jason wondered if it was a kind of circular prophesy. Everyone respected his need to be alone while he sat in a dark room torn and quartered by loneliness, the dread that he was something unwelcome, and a desperate terror at the thought of being surrounded by people on a cramped ship.

“ _You know, if you ever want to talk about-”_

“ _I don’t.”_

He usually ate like a rabbit, small nibbles and little pieces at best. No appetite for big helpings or boisterous friends yelling at each other across a long wooden table.

All Jason had wanted was to bring him dinner.

“ _It’s just that…I know you think no one understands, but I was_ there _. I saw-”_

“ _Yes, thanks a ton for reminding me about that.”_

Except the food was getting colder and colder on his nightstand. He was so _thin_ , all corded muscle and sharp bone. Jason could easily feel the stepladder of his ribs under his black shirt.

“ _I’m sorry, you’re right. I didn’t mean to- I’ll just leave this here and go.”_

Jason’s fingers dug into the hem of his shirt and Nico lifted him arms, arched up to help it off. They both shuddered when Nico’s waist brushed against his lap.

“ _No…wait.”_

He kissed him again, harder than before, and jolted in surprise when Nico nipped at the scar on his lip. Trapped it between his teeth and ran the very tip of his tongue along it like he was trying to taste it and gripped Jason’s shirt almost tight enough to tear. They parted long enough for Jason to pull it over his head and threw it anywhere, anyplace, who cared so long as as they could be skin to skin; Nico a chilled, frail wraith of a boy Jason wanted to shelter like a baby bird.

“ _Do you know the worst part about being the son of Hades?”_

He looked down into eyes ringed black by too-little sleep, grim and smoldering with the half-madness of a boy for whom death had no more secrets.

“ _Not even death would end anything.”_

He pinned Nico’s arms above his head, pads of his thumbs over his unmarred wrists, the bumps of his veins, felt his beating pulse. He nosed his collarbone, nuzzled his neck. Keening, Nico raised his chin and let Jason feel his pulse with his mouth. Bit and sucked marks and drew out fresh moans.

“ _I don’t like hearing you talk like that.”_

Nico’s eyes were hazy and drunk with warmth and touch. Jason wondered if it was really him he was seeing or if he was just letting himself pretend the shape in the dark was someone else.

“ _Yeah? Well don’t worry. Like I said dying wouldn’t change a thing.”_

Even with a belt Nico’s jeans hung off his bony hips. Jason unclasped it one-handed and played with the goosebumps on his chest using his lips, his teeth, his tongue. Enjoyed the litany of mewling gasps as he worked his way down, kissed Nico’s heaving belly. The jeans slid down his slim waist easily.

“ _It’d probably break my mother’s heart more than me being- mmf…”_

The thought came to him, grasping Nico through his boxers, that this could be a mistake. That this would be a burden, a complication instead of relief, but when he stopped Nico grasped his shoulders hard and kissed him with a mouthful of pleading moans and Jason’s doubts evaporated.

“ _W-why did you do that?”_

He knew Nico needed this, maybe they both did. He’d seen his heart, exposed and vulnerable, shivering with so much hurt and shame and the agonizing ache over what the two of them knew he could never have. He felt a powerful need to comfort him, to make him forget- if only for a little while.

“ _Does this mean there’s something wrong with me too, Nico?”_

Mouths locked, teeth sucking on his scarred lip again. Nico groped blindly for his belt, refusing to break the kiss like their breaths were entwined. After too much fumbling Jason lost his patience and did it for him, shimmying out of his pants awkwardly because Nico was combing his fingers through his hair and adamant that their battle of tongues be one without end.

“ _What? N-no! Gods no, you’re Jason, you’re_ the _Jason. You’re you’re the Champion of Juno, you’re praetor of-”_

He was so tentative at first, shirking away the moment his fingertips touched the fabric of Jason’s boxers. Jason laid another claim to his throat with teeth and rough, suckling kisses that made Nico squirm under him. Without meaning to, he rubbed himself against Nico’s thigh.

“ _Then what makes you so special?”_

He guided their hands down between them, two pairs of hands pulling down two waistbands, gripped themselves and each other so tight. Quivering bundles of nerves and flesh and heat and they both exhaled sharply, put their lips together again and breathed for each other while they moved.

“ _Promise me.”_

Fingernails dug into his back to join a proud collection of scars from demigods and beasts in far less compromising situations. Nico’s legs tangled with his as they ground against one another. Their lips stopped saying anything resembling words so long ago and they scarcely had time between breathing and their attempts to devour each other.

“ _Huh?”_

Nico whimpered and Jason forced down a low noise with clenched teeth and their explosive release splattered coolness on damp, sweltering skin.

“ _That you won’t hate yourself when it’s all over.”_

The cabin smelled of Roman tents in the late morning before a battle, of sweat and relief. They panted like they’d just fought off a pack of wolves, and Jason held onto him until those brown eyes slowly opened, dark like a sunset’s shadow instead of the depths of Hades.

Nico said nothing and turned his back on him as close to the bed’s edge without falling off, curled into his sheets though he must have been warm. Not being told to leave, Jason let himself doze in stuporing afterglow.

He woke early and found his arm around his bed-mate, who had drifted away from the edge and was curled against him, still deep in sleep.

“ _No promises.”_

* * *

Unused to sleeping late and only half-awake, Nico shot upright in his bed at the sound of the cabin door unlatching. The dozen or red and purple hickies were impossible to miss against the canvas of his pale skin.  Blushing, alone in his bed, and very much without clothes, he hurriedly wrapped a bed sheet around himself.

Nico wasn’t sure to be relieved or not when Jason came in, freshly clothed and carrying two plates of breakfast. He nudged the door shut with his foot and blinked, surprised at seeing Nico awake, then grinned at the sight of him with sleepy eyes, his hair a bird’s nest, and thoroughly abused shoulders sticking up from the bed sheet like a toga.

“Hail, Legate,” Jason chuckled. “I brought breakfast since…well…dinner didn’t really pan out like I planned.”

Nico was grateful that at least he wasn’t the only one blushing. He looked down at the plate Jason handed him doubtfully. “I’m not really that hungr-”

The  _look_  Jason gave him came out like a drawn sword and Nico found himself nibbling on a piece of toast before he could even think of challenging it. Oh right, son of Jupiter. “Thank you,” he mumbled.

“You’re welcome,” the look gone all at once, Jason grinned proudly before he sat down on a stool and started in on his own plate with gusto.

They sat there quietly in the cabin, Nico almost finishing a second piece of toast while Jason scarfed down his breakfast like a foe to be vanquished, pausing between bites to ask Nico, “Sleep okay?”

“I…” the question caught him off guard, because when he thought about it he actually _did_  have a decent night’s sleep. He didn’t even have any idea what time it was. “Yeah, I did. Thanks.”

“Good,” Jason nodded and kept eating.

Nico waited for him to say something, anything else instead of just chewing with that stupid mouth that made him remember how that scar felt against his lips and- “Why?” he blurted. Oh gods.

Jason looked up from his food. “What was that?”

Feeling his ears heat up and aware of every single kiss-shaped bruise under the bed sheet, Nico said, “…last night. Why did you do… _that_?”

“I think that was sort of a team effort, there.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Yeah, I know,” Jason sighed and set his plate aside. “I guess it was because…you looked like you needed somebody, right then.”

He shot him a cold, damning glare. “So what? It was pity?”

Jason was probably one of the few people on earth that could meet the son of Hades in the eye and not flinch. “No. I did it because you’re my friend, you were hurting, and you needed somebody to remind you that you’re not alone.  _That’s_ why.”

Not sure how to interpret that, Nico stared pensively down at his food. “So you did…that because I’m just another one of your friends?”

“My friends are my comrades, and my comrades are not ‘just’ anything to me,” Jason said it like a soldier’s mantra. “ _You_ are not ‘just’ anything.”

Nico spied the SPQR peeking from the under Jason’s sleeve. It made sense, in a weird kinda Roman way. “But you’re not…I mean- you and Piper…”

“Son of Jupiter,” Jason said, as if it explained everything.

Maybe it did.

“Do you…regret it?” Jason asked.

Nico saw it then: the worry. The worry for him. Afraid he’d done more harm than good and Nico wasn’t even sure, it didn’t feel right or wrong or anything at the time but tension leaving him.

And the trust.

“No,” Nico finally said, and watched Jason relax. “I don’t regret it. You said some things…before and I think I have a lot of stuff to think about. But for right now, I think I’m…okay.”

“That’s good to hear, man. Really good to hear. I’m glad. Just…don’t forget that you don’t have to deal with this alone. I know you like it that way, but it also doesn’t have to be  _all_  the time, right?”

“I…yeah. Maybe.” He shrugged, met Jason’s eyes for a heartbeat, and smirked. “No promises.”

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't even read a single one of the Percy Jackson books but between my sempai who's bloody obsessed and all the damn awesome fanart out I've ended up loving Nico, it's not fair. Still, fairly pleased how it came out. 
> 
> Also as a historian I've always been a little miffed that in a series about Greek and Roman mythology and culture there is virtually no mention of all the same-sex shenanigans, so I decided that at least the Roman Camp is a little more...faithful to its roots.


End file.
